486 



PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



and, secondly, because the two earlier forms of practical 

 politics named above had first to be tried and found to be 

 wanting before the last stage became possible or practical. 

 The first remark leads him to a doctrine which holds an 

 important position in his system, and which has, by 

 some of his followers, been considered to rank as an 

 important discovery. It is his classification or his 

 doctrine of the " hierarchy of the sciences." l 



1 These quotations are all taken 

 from the reprint of the earlier 

 Tract (1822), in the Appendix to 

 the fourth volume (p. 547 sqq.) 

 of the ' System of Positive Polity, 

 or Treatise on Sociology.' (Eng. 

 transl., London, 1875-77.) The 

 object which Comte had in view in 

 reprinting a collection of his earlier 

 Tracts was, as he says, " to demon- 

 strate the perfect harmony which 

 exists between my youthful efforts 

 and my matured conceptions" 

 (General Appendix, p. 1) "... 

 when reproducing . . . the third 

 Essay, published in May 1822, . . . 

 in 1824, ... I thought it right to 

 add to its special title that of 

 'System of Positive Polity,' a 

 title premature indeed, but rightly 

 indicating the scope of my labours " 

 (p. 3). This is important as bear- 

 ing upon the question to what 

 extent Comte modified his philo- 

 sophical creed in the latter part 

 of his career. Two extreme views 

 exist on this point, represented 

 among others by Littre* and 

 Robinet, of whom the former dis- 

 cards everything that Comte pub- 

 lished after the year 1842, whereas 

 the latter considers the principal 

 merit of Comte to consist in the 

 foundation of a new religion, the 

 Religion of Humanity. In spite 

 of the extravagances of the later 

 doctrine, which drew from Mill a 

 strong condemnation, we are bound 



to look upon Comte's last practical 

 effort as a highly instructive object- 

 lesson. He recognised the neces- 

 sity of establishing some -SiTETlSfTty 

 or spiritual power which should 

 guarantee a moral control, superior 

 to the intellectual and practical 

 spheres of social and political life 

 and work, and which should keep 

 in order the Intellectuals as well 

 as the Industrials. It is well to 

 note that the spiritual power is 

 vested in those who have been 

 drawn from the intellectual class, 

 and who, as is more fully explained 

 in the ' Politique Positive,' have 

 learnt from history that the 

 altruistic feelings more exactly 

 defined as attachment or sym- 

 pathy, reverence and benevolence, 

 are on the way of gradually con- 

 quering the egoistic or animal 

 tendencies inherent in human 

 nature. With this is also con- 

 nected the emphasis laid by Comte 

 upon education, which he no- 

 where limits to instruction, as was 

 at that time very common in 

 his country. We may also note 

 that he does not believe that the 

 higher grades of positive know- 

 ledge can ever become general, 

 and we infer that among the 

 Industrials he also classes the 

 Proletariat or the masses, of whom 

 Mill complains that he does not 

 take sufficient note in his political 

 scheme. 



